Module 01: What Is Political Science?

Political socialization is the process by which individuals learn and develop their political beliefs, values, and attitudes over time.

Political culture refers to the shared beliefs, values, attitudes, and expectations that people in a society have about politics and government.

Political ideology is a set of beliefs, values, and ideas about how society should be organized and how power should be used.

Postbehavioralism combines empirical research with normative concerns, aiming to make political science both accurate and relevant.

Behavioralism is an approach to political science that focuses on observable behavior, data, and scientific methods to study politics.

Traditionalism seeks to understand politics through ideas, history, and philosophy, with an emphasis on ideals rather than observable outcomes.

Normative theory evaluates values. Empirical theory analyzes reality.

Political power is the ability to influence decisions, shape outcomes, or control the behavior of others within a society or across nations.

Political science is the systematic study of how power is organized, distributed, and used to make decisions within and between societies.

Module 1 introduces political science as the study of power, especially how power is organized, distributed, and used within societies and between nations. It explains key foundational ideas such as political power, the difference between normative theory (what should be) and empirical theory (what is), and three major approaches within the field: traditionalism, behavioralism, and postbehavioralism.